James McAvoy once turned down a potentially career-changing offer in his early days in Hollywood. 

The X-Men star recently revealed that he was offered a role in the first Harry Potter film, along with a major paycheck, but ultimately decided to pursue more consistent work as a young actor.

During an appearance on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, while promoting his latest film Speak No Evil, McAvoy was asked whether he would be interested in playing a Hogwarts teacher or appearing in a future Star Wars project.

The Scottish actor revealed that he was approached to play a young version of Tom Riddle in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, the character who later becomes known as the evil wizard Voldemort.

Mcavoy responded, “Almost, yeah, I can probably say this one. The very first movie, I think it was — who is the — is it Tom Riddle in the first one, yeah?”

“But he’s like in it… for like a scene in a flashback or something like that? And they had — I simply remember it was right in the beginning of my career,” he said.

However, the lucrative deal came with strings attached. McAvoy would have been required to sign a seven-month retainer, effectively preventing him from taking on other acting work during that period.

“I auditioned for it and I think they wanted to put me on a retainer. And they offered me something like – it was crazy,” he added.

“I’d hardly done any work – and me and I think maybe 10 other actors or something like that – they wanted to put us on retainer so that they could hold us and keep us to choose later.”

The offer came with a £40,000 paycheck, which was a massive sum for the then-unknown actor.

“For me, at that time, it was a ton of money, it was like £40,000 or something like that, and I’d done very little work,” he said.

Following the advice of his agent, Ruth Young, McAvoy made the bold decision to turn down the Harry Potter opportunity. Instead, he opted for a theatre role that paid considerably less – just £275 per week.

McAvoy has no regrets for turning down the opportunity. He believes the theatre experience was instrumental in shaping his craft and career direction.

“It was part of the making of me, and I actually got in acting work. I was actually learning and doing all that,” McAvoy stated.

When asked about potentially auditioning for the upcoming HBO Harry Potter television adaptation, McAvoy showed little interest.

He expressed satisfaction with his current career achievements.

He said, “I don’t know if there’s anything that I’m really missing in terms of what I’ve covered.”

“I don’t think I’ve done enough sci-fi, just because I love it,” he said, pointing to his role in 2003’s Children of Dune and the X-Men movies.

“I don’t think I’ve done enough comedy but I’ve been able to be funny in things that aren’t funny. Always trying to bring the gags.”

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Source: USA Today